Updated: May 19, 2024

We ask everyone who enters TBC to participate in the following measures.

• Please DO NOT come into TBC if you are ill with symptoms of infection. Call your care team for advice and follow-up care. If you have been ill and symptoms are improving for at least 24 hours, when you enter TBC wear a mask until 10 days after the start of your symptoms.
• Answer the posted self-screening questions before entering the space, and turn away / come back at a different time if you have YES answers.
• Clean your hands at entry and during your visit with alcohol-based hand rub or soap and water.
• If you feel well, decide whether to wear a medical grade mask during your visit based on your personal understanding of risk to yourself and others. TBC will continue to provide masks and anyone who chooses to wear one is welcome.
• Please remember we have community members who are at higher risk of complications from infection with viruses, including newborn babies, and masks are proven to reduce the spread of infection by droplets. Toronto Public Health advises us to “Consider wearing a high quality, well-fitting mask in crowded indoor public settings with poor ventilation, especially if you or people around you are at higher risk”.
• If you want members of the care team to wear a mask when they provide care to you up-close – just ask. TBC staff and midwives will make every effort to meet your request.

There is currently no limit to the number of support people who can come with you to labour and give birth at TBC.

If you are attending a TBC clinic, check with your care provider for guidance about support people.

If a person planning to give birth at TBC, or a support person, has symptoms of a respiratory or gastro-intestinal illness, they can enter TBC after following public health guidelines:

• They have no fever without the use of medications, AND
• Symptoms (i.e., cough, headache, lethargy) have been improving for more than 24 hours, 48 hours for gastro-intestinal symptoms (i.e., nausea, vomiting, diarrhea).

Other important public health guidance:

• Stay up-to-date with vaccinations, including for COVID-19 and influenza ("flu shot").
• Follow current public health recommendations for monitoring and responding to symptoms of illness, including staying home when you are sick, testing and treatment for COVID-19, prioritizing the outdoors and well-ventilated spaces for socializing, and considering masking in crowded indoor public settings. For more info click HERE.

If you have any concerns or questions about how these measures may impact you, please discuss them with your midwives or other caregivers. If you need further information or have further concerns, please email TBC Clinical Director at [email protected].

TBC will continue to use the data available from Public Health Ontario and from Toronto Public Health on respiratory virus prevalence and hospitalization rates to made decisions about the infection prevention measures to put or keep in place. It may be necessary to bring back mask requirements if community rates of COVID-19 and other respiratory viruses rise, eg. in Fall / Winter.